100 China in World History
Four Treasuries was to include a copy of every signifi cant work ever
published in Chinese. Part of the emperor’s concern was to collect all
known works in order to suppress anything that was judged harmful
to the dynasty or to public morals. Therefore, some military works, all
works with anti-Manchu content, and works judged to be heretical as
pornographic or as anti-Confucian were to be burned. Anyone who
harbored subversive writings faced the death penalty, but if they turned
in such works they were not punished.
The three great emperors of the Qing—Kangxi, Yongzheng, and
Qianlong—saw themselves as sage-kings in ways that extended the Chi-
nese model of emperorship beyond the Chinese-speaking world. They
presided over a multiethnic empire, uniting the Manchus with the Chi-
nese, the Mongols, the Uighurs, the Tibetans, and many minority tribes
in south and southwest China. They were very conscientious, deeply
versed in the traditions of Confucianism and Buddhism themselves, and
not about to tolerate criticisms of their rule.
The Manchu emperors and their Chinese offi cials saw the eighteenth
century as one of China’s greatest eras of peace and prosperity. Cultur-
ally and politically it was a conservative time, partly enforced by strong-
willed emperors and partly embraced by Chinese scholar-offi cials who
came to reject the late-Ming trends of individualism and creativity in
philosophy and art as somehow responsible for the Ming collapse and
the Manchu conquest. The school of Wang Yangming fell into general
disfavor in the early Qing, but there were also creative developments
in art and philosophy, even if they were not as exuberant as in the late
Ming. Some painters and writers found subtle ways to express their
unhappiness with Manchu rule or with Chinese society.
Two of China’s greatest novels were written in the middle of the
eighteenth century. Wu Jingzi, a failed examination candidate, wrote
a brilliant satirical novel, Unoffi cial History of the Scholars, poking
fun at ignorant and arrogant scholars who cared only about examina-
tion success, wealth, and status. Cao Xueqin, whose Chinese grand-
father had been a close personal bondservant of the Kangxi Emperor,
wroteThe Dream of the Red Chamber (also known as The Story of the
Stone), which is universally acknowledged as China’s greatest novel. Set
in a framework of Buddhist reincarnation and proclaiming the illusory
nature of material life, The Dream of the Red Chamber is a compelling
psychological portrait of a very large and powerful family gradually
falling into poverty and disgrace.
These two novels seem prophetic, in that the Qianlong reign was
glorious on the surface but showed by its end the unmistakable signs